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The technology of today has been amazing to enable humans to do incredible things, but it also has made us a comedy act as we interact with it. It didn’t take long for me to recognize a myriad of silly things we do now using our tech.
See how many of these scenarios you have found yourself doing and have a laugh for the day.
The zombie walker. How many times have you seen a person walking with their phone engrossed with an Instagram posting walking straight into a busy intersection, hitting a glass door, or walking into the person in front of them? You hope they don’t get hurt but it’s pure comedy gold to watch this weird behavior as a spectator sport.
Auto correct and thumb typing. Many of us had to learn typing in school using all our fingers but now we can only use one or two fingers on our phones. When combined with bad typing skills and autocorrect you are doomed to send questionable text or emails to our friends and family. I must chuckle when my family wonders if I have gone nuts sending a text that indicates I had hamsters for dinner or a reference to a body part comes up when I was sharing weather news. There is no way to avoid the comedy around this.
Communication blocked. At times, my wife and I will want to watch different TV or videos but still sit in the same room. She will wear her Apple Airpods and watch a video on her iPad, while I watch the TV. Now, since the Airpods can specifically filter out my voice, she never hears me asking her a question. Even if I start waving my arms, the iPad has her focused attention.
So, the only way I can reach her, being only 8 feet away, is to send her a text message. She gives me that wife look but answers me back through another text. I can only laugh at our behavior sometimes.
Alexa the spy. I do enjoy using the Amazon Alexa to run things in the house, play music, and ask for the weather but it can be sneaky. One day my wife decided to say a couple funny things to Alexa to see what her response was going to be. It was then that I let her know that Alexa records and saves everything you say to it. She turned white and quickly demanded that I remove everything she has ever said. After I showed her all the stored statements, I did delete everything and then shut off that feature so she would not demand I destroy Alexa in the fire pit.
I do wonder why I start getting email ads for a left-handed screwdriver when I simply asked Alexa for the best way to repair my lawn mower. Have you ever had a mystery package show up from Amazon after you realize Alexa answered a query from the TV?
Mark Conde of Murphy is a retired chief information officer and self-described technology nerd. Email him at
jmconde818@gmail.com.